


98 Dead Bodies On The Ground

by Rosae



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Dad Reaper | Gabriel Reyes, Deadlock Gang, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Medical Experimentation, M/M, Sombra and Jesse are Adoptive siblings, Young Jesse McCree, Young Sombra
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-11-08
Updated: 2018-05-22
Packaged: 2019-01-30 23:02:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,654
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12663240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rosae/pseuds/Rosae
Summary: Gabriel Reyes had been prepared to take down the infamous Deadlock gang, he wasn't prepared to find two children in poor shape on the run from whatever had made them. Oh well, sometimes that's just how life turns out.





	1. Discovery

**Author's Note:**

> Alright, my first official overwatch fanfic! This is going to have more chapters as I feel like adding them, but I do have quite the plan for this universe. Also apologies in advance for the limited Spanish here, I'm still not that good at it so feel free to correct me!

Seven soldiers. The rest of the deadlock gang hadn’t hit even one of his men, their traps had been annoying at best and even tracking down the hideout hadn’t been that much of a problem, the only issue being that the deadlock gang only kept paper records in this day and age. The whole operation had gone off without a hitch up until this point, until he’d sent a group to check out the last rooms on the top floor and it’d all gone to hell and now he had seven soldiers barely clinging to life, they’d be dead if it wasn’t for the experimental healing packs they were testing. 

Gabriel had managed to drag all seven men away from the door that held their killer. His four other men who had stayed with him keeping cover in case whatever monster hide in that room tried for an escape. Seven men, all his responsibility now lay on the ground barely breathing near the exit of the deadlock hideout waiting for an evac. The moment the last of them were at least relativity safe, Gabriel was storming back with his gun in his hand and murder in his eyes.

“Any idea what’s in there?” He asked Lt. Jacobson, who had been the first to reach the others and who had been holding over the situation in his absence. 

“Nope, by the time I’d gotten here they were all out. I scanned the two surrounding rooms, nothing in either but crates full of drugs and no connection to the outside which means whatever shot them is still in there.” Lt. Jacobson reported, looking grim. 

“Good, we’re gasing it then.” Gabriel replied, and as an afterthought, “Nothing lethal though, I want to look whatever son of a bitch shot my men in the eye before I kill him.” Lt. Jacobson didn’t comment, just nodded and set about preparing the grenade. It was a fairly simple compound but it worked quick and only required a small dosage before the target would be out like a light. He was using a fairly high concentration, Gabriel just hoped it’d be enough for whatever the hell was there. 

“Ready Sir.” Gabriel threw a hand signal to the three other men who had their guns pointed at the door. Each nodded in affirmative and switched on their filters, Gabriel and Lt. Jacobson followed suit. Gabriel gave a nod to Lt. Jacobson, and the grenade was thrown.

There was a gunshot, some loud spanish too garbled for Gabriel to make out, a thud and dead silence. So whatever was in there was human, good, Gabriel hated dealing with magical bullshit. The gas slowly began to disperse from the room, and after two minutes it was clear enough to enter.

Gabriel didn’t bother with a hand signal or to wait for his men, he strode towards the room with purpose. A cold fury encompassed every part of his being as he pushed open the door, he was ready to take a terrifying pleasure in revenge on the person who’d harmed his men. He was ready to see another tattoo covered man with grime and a nasty look about them. He was ready to see yet another person who thought themselves above the law and took pleasure in thinking so. He was ready to see a murder who had shot seven of his men with the intent to kill.

Yet Gabriel Reyes was not ready for what he actually found. Lying on ground, slumped against a crate was a boy. The kid couldn’t have been more than seventeen if that, and he was rail thin. There was a honest to god cowboy hat on the kid’s head, and his limp hand held a gun that looked older than the kid himself. Gabriel had frozen in place, his mind reeling with the implications of the kid before him. There was nobody else in the room, which meant this kid had shot his men. This kid who wouldn’t have even been out of high school yet, who looked like he would blow away in the wind, had shot seven of his men with damn good aim. 

“Boss?” Came a hesitant voice behind him, Jacobson peered her head in cautiously, only to see the same scene Gabriel was currently still computing “Fuck, is that a kid?” 

Gabriel just nodded and pressed his knuckles into his forehead, trying to massage away some of the headache he could feel forming. Letting out a sigh, he moved over the kid and pulled at the lid to the crate the kid had been leaning up against, muttering half to himself and half to Jacobson “Might as well see what’s so important that this kid decided to shot people.”

His Lt just nodded and gave the all clear to the three others outside who took the hint and made their way back downstairs to watch over their comrades. The lid to the crate came off fairly easily, and Gabriel was greeted with the sight of yet more cocaine. Whole damn thing was filled to the brim with packages of the stuff. 

Some part of him snapped right than there. Without thinking Gabriel kicked at the crate as if it was somehow to blame for this kid somehow ending up so fucked up that he was shooting people over drugs. A almost hollow noise rang back, and he and Jacobson both froze. 

A little more gently this time, Gabriel gave the crate a second kick, and again he got the same almost hollow response. He glanced back to Jacobson, who seemed just as surprised as Gabriel himself was. 

“Move the kid outta the way, looks like there’s something else in this one.” Gabriel said, even though he probably didn’t need to as Jacobson had already started to move. The kid was shifted to lean up against the wall instead as Gabriel pulled out his knife to pry at the side of the crates. After Jacobson had checked the other crates and found them all solid, she moved to help him as well. It took a total of almost ten minutes, the crate was far more heavily reinforced than Gabriel had original suspected, but it eventually gave way to their combined strength.

Given the day he’d been having, Gabriel wasn’t quite sure what he’d been expecting to find inside that crate. Maybe weapons or information. Whatever it was, he certainly hadn’t been expecting a girl, who looked maybe nine or ten, with fucking cybernetic enhancements of all things to come tumbling out. There was a second of stunned silence before Gabriel was scrambling down, pressing his fingers to her neck and praying that she was still alive and the high concentration of gas hadn’t done her in. 

She had a pulse. It was weak, but it was there and the panic subsided. Gabriel let out a sigh and checked her over quickly for any other sign of injury. Unlike the boy they’d found, she seemed to be at least somewhat fed. Still far too skinny for Gabriel’s liking, but it was a massive improvement over the scrawny kid leaned up against the wall next to them. She also seemed to be relatively unharmed, no scars besides one on her neck that appeared to be from her modifications and no bruises other than a small one on her leg. 

“Fuck.” Jacobson repeated for the second time that day, and Gabriel was inclined to agree with her. 

“How long till the evac and clean up get here?” Gabriel asked, a plan starting to form. He still hadn’t forgiven the kid leaning up against the wall for shooting his men, but he could understand it now. And he’d be damned if he was killing a kid, let alone one who’d been protecting another kid. 

“Ten minutes. What’s the plan?” Jacobson asked, half a question and half a sigh because she had known Gabriel for two years and she knew damn well what his answer was going to be. 

“Grab the boy, I got this one, we’re taking ‘em with us.” Gabriel’s mind was made up, he didn’t care how much shit Jack was going to give him over this.

Jacobson wisely said nothing and moved to scoop up the boy and, each carrying a child who was far too young to be here, they descended down the stairs to where the rest of Gabriel’s team waited.

\-------

“Reyes.”

“Morrison.”

They held a long look between them. Gabriel held his ground. Jack gave in, there’d be no reasoning with Gabriel on this, but he had to put up at least a token effort. 

“The boy shot seven men with the intent to kill.” It was half said and half sighed, the real implication was ‘Do you know how much paperwork you are causing me right now?’

“He’s was child protecting another child from faceless gun men who burst into his place of living, wouldn’t hold up in a court of law ‘specially not with the records indicating he’s been groomed for it.” ‘Yep.’ Gabriel’s reply was firm and smug, with a look in his eyes that said he knew he’d won.

“How do you know he was protecting her?” That was a legitimate question, mission reports hadn’t been filed yet and Jack was curious. 

“The smuggler’s box she was in closed from the inside, which meant she locked herself in there. Not to mention Deadlock’s been firm on not dealing in the slave trade, too much trouble for them. I’m honestly still shocked they had these kids there at all, but there’s no mistaking that tattoo on the boy’s arm.” 

“Ah.”

There was silence between the two men for a long few seconds, Jack was running the new info through his head and just taking in the two children in front of him. He glanced up at the corner of the room, no security cameras. One breath in, one breath out.

“Would’ve been nice if you’d given me more than five minutes heads up that we were adopting children.” The tone was resigned, and Jack leaned his head over onto his not-quite-husband’s shoulder, he could pre-emptively feel the headache he was going to get over deal with this, but looking at the two kids, kids who had been running with a gang that was having them kill people, he couldn’t say no.

“To be fair, I didn’t get any warning. Went into a base to knock some heads together and came out with two kids who had no fucking right to be there.” He moved his hand to rub at Jack’s shoulders, a tiny sign of affection that meant so much more. “Legally speaking though, we’re not adopting ‘em. I’m recruiting the boy into Blackwatch and the girl is staying with us as a condition of that. I don’t think they’d agree to anything else, given the look of ‘em they’d never trust an actual adoption and they’d be gone in a week.”

Jack nodded, he didn’t like it, but Gabriel was right, with the situation the two had come from it’d be a long time before either child was willing to trust anything coming for free. It wouldn’t be too bad, missions were strictly restricted to recruits that had had at least a year of training, so there’d be time to win their trust before they had to be put in danger. 

“Alright, I’ll get you a care of order, I’m owed a favor by one of the high command and I’m sure she’ll agree. You’re telling Ana though.” It was Jack’s turn to be smug as Gabriel groaned. 

“Maybe we should just tell Fareeha she’s got some siblings now and let her break the news.” A laugh and a shake of the head. “You’re right, Ana would kill me.”

“Yep.” 

A little more silence, more comfortable this time before Jack leaned up to give his not-quite -husband a kiss. “I’ve got to be be off now, gotta get ahead on all the paperwork because this is going to cause a mess of it I’m sure. Let me know how waking them up goes?” 

Gabriel returned the kiss and nodded, turning his attention back to plotting out how to do just that. 

\---------

In the end he deciding on waking up the boy first. He was the one Gabriel would actually be recruiting, and he had a feeling if he could get the boy to agree the girl would follow. Convincing the boy hopefully wouldn’t be too hard either, and he already had a signed care of order from Jack that guaranteed him the ability to both make the offer and force it if the kid didn’t agree. 

He’d been moved into an interrogation room after his IV was removed. Gabriel didn’t like it, but there wasn’t any other way the kid would buy into the whole scene otherwise. 

It’d been about an hour of waiting behind the mirrored glass before the kid began to stir. A minute after that and the kid seemed to finally realize something was very wrong and jumped into wakefulness. It was like watching a wild animal undergoing all stages of loss at the same time. The kid jerked left and right, spun his head around, and seemed to give up all in the same breath. Gabriel waited five minutes for the kid to calm down somewhat and seem to collect himself. Normally he’d have been in there from the start to take advantage of that confusion, but Gabriel still wasn’t entirely convinced that the kid was harmless gun or no gun. You didn’t get into a gang like that and survive without some skill, and Gabriel didn’t like to underestimate people, it’d already almost cost him seven men. 

After five minutes comprised largely of Gabriel fighting every paternal instinct his body to not try and comfort the kid who had a look of terror about it and convincing himself it was for the best, Gabriel strood into the room. His shoulders were set in a firm line, and he kept his face neutral with the slightest hint of judgement. Complete stillness engulfed the kid as Gabriel took the seat opposite him and tossed down a stack of papers onto the small table, most of them blank forms. The kid was sizing him up and looking for motive, best keep that in the dark for a bit.

“Let’s get the boring questions out of the way, name and age?” Gabriel wasn’t really expecting an answer, but turns out this kid was full of surprises.

“Joel, 18.” the kid replied, and Gabriel took a moment to watch him. There were none of the immediate tell tales of a lie, but he wasn’t dumb, and despite how much he desperately wanted to believe the kid was 18, it just wasn’t possible. He wasn’t able to tell if the name was a lie or not, they hadn’t been able to find anything on these kids, best to assume it was. 

“Try again, I’m not dumb kid.”

Hesitation, the kid was weighing the pros and cons of holding up the lie. He looked up to meet Gabriel’s eyes “It’s tha truth”. A bold faced lie and they both knew it but the kid held his ground. Apparently this kid was concerned enough about hiding who he was to risk a beating for it, given the slight finches every time Gabriel shifted. Fuck. This hadn’t been how he had wanted this to go, but the kid wasn’t going to give him anything to work with otherwise.

“If I ask the girl you were hiding, do you think that’ll be her answer too?” Deer in the headlights, the kid looked terrified and he knew he’d been caught. Maybe he’d been hoping the girl would’ve gotten away Gabriel mused as he watched the fear turned into anger. “Calm down kid, I’m not threatening her, I don’t consider myself a very nice person but I’ve got fucking boundaries.” 

The anger dissipated, not entirely, but enough that the kid wasn’t going to lash out. Now there was more caution than anything else. A little bit of respect maybe, but not much.

“I’m not tellin’ you shit. Don’t ev’n know anythin’ you’d wanna know.” The kid had hunched a little, but his words were careful and not as aggressive as they could’ve been. Gabriel weighed his options and decided the name and age could come afterwards, he needed to make the offer now so the kid didn’t think he was just after gang info.

“Probably right on that one, see I’m not particularly interested in info on Deadlock. I’m interested in the kid who managed to shoot down seven of my men damn near perfectly through a crack in doorway.” Gabriel delivered his motive on platter as he moved to shuffle through the papers looking for the ones he’d actually need. 

That seemed to have caught the kid’s interest, there was something between pride and fear in the kid’s eyes. “...What’ch mean by that?”

“I mean I’m offering you a job. You ever heard of Overwatch? Well I’m in charge of it’s counterpart, Blackwatch. The ones who actually get shit done instead of posing for cameras. You’ll be doing pretty much the same shit you did in Deadlock but you won’t get starved and beaten half to death for it.” Oh that’d hit a nerve. The kid was looking indignant now but given the state he was in; more bruise than not and stick thin with just a wiry layer of muscle holding him together, he was in no place to try and deny it. “Your… friend will also be able to stay here as long as you’re working for us, if she wants to.”

“You government then?” Huh, not the question he’d been expecting. Gabriel eye’d the kid again, looking up from the forms he’d been casually reviewing. He looked, resigned? Sad? Whatever it was, it wasn’t what Gabriel had been expecting and it certainly threw him off.

“Of a sort, yes. Why’s that important to you?” 

The kid seemed to debate answering him, the struggle was clear on his face and Gabriel let the silence stretched on, let the kid decide how he wanted this to turn out. Finally, the kid looked at him, right into the eyes and began to speak in a slow, quiet voice.

“You won’t be able ta keep us here. Me ‘n my sister. They’ll come for us, they always do and there ain’t a legal force that can keep ‘em from us. S’why we were running with Deadlock, they were shit but they never kept a digital record so they couldn’t find us. If we’re here, they’ll know. Prolly already on their way.” That hadn’t been what Gabriel had expected, but the kid’s eyes looked dead serious. It wasn’t too hard to believe, the enhancements the girl had were illegal by U.N. law at any age, let alone for someone to have installed those on a child. Experiments on the run then, made sense, might explain a kid taking out seven men with that thing he called a gun. It was a complication, but he’d be damned if he was giving up on these kids without one hell of a fight.

“I suppose it’s a good thing that Blackwatch operates outside the law then. Not a legal force on this earth I can’t break, especially not if I have Jack Morrison backing me on it.” Now there was some recognition. Everyone had heard of Jack Morrison, didn’t matter what fucked up corner of the world they came from, and for once Gabriel was glad. The kid was regarding him with something that Gabriel wanted to call hope. So he made his offer again, turned the paper’s around and handing the kid a pen. 

“You sign those and you’re mine, by any legal extent and quite a bit past it. I don’t know who's chasing you, and I don’t care. I don’t let my men go unless it’s over my dead body or by their own choice.” His voice was firm, and yep that was some goddamn hope in the kid’s eyes as he seemed to regard Gabriel in a new light. Not all of what he said was true, he cared about what was chasing these kids, but poking around at it didn’t seem wise. The kid looked down at the papers and then back up at Gabriel, it seemed he had said enough of the right thing. Biting his already broken lip, the kid put the pen to the paper and scribbled. It was on the wrong line, not dated and would never hold up in any court of law, but the papers had been for show anyways, to cement the kid’s choice in stone. Gabriel gave the kid a smile, and while the kid didn’t smile back, there was one hiding behind those wary eyes. 

Standing up more slowly than he normally would, Gabriel rounded the table and ignored the way the kid flinched as he unlocked the handcuffs and gestured for the kid to follow him out of the room.

“Alright kid, from now on I’m Commander Reyes to you and nothing else. You’ll get some proper clothes on you soon enough as well as a full tour of the facility. For right now until I decide otherwise, you’ll be restricted to the training area, your room, two of the break rooms and the dining area. Unless ordered otherwise by me, Morrison or Ana directly, you don’t go anywhere else. You see any sign of this ‘them’ you’re talking about, you find one of us three and we’ll handle it, got it kid?” 

“Jesse, and I got it.” That got a reaction out of Gabriel, he turned and looked back at the kid, the kid looked back at him with a determined look in his eyes and Gabriel knew it wasn’t a lie. 

“Alright Jesse, mind telling me how old you actually are for the paperwork?” It was pushing, but he had to know.

“Neither ‘a us know our exact ages, but I’m pretty sure I’m 16, might be 15.” Gabriel had suspected as much, but it still made him want to fight someone. Preferable whatever assholes had turned these kids into what they were today. He was about to reply, when the kid spoke up first.

“Where we headed now?” The ki- Jesse seemed a little wary, which was fair enough so Gabriel chose to leave the ‘don’t ask questions’ talk for another day.

“To get your sister and let her know the arrangement, she’s been out for observation but Ana should’ve woken her up about five minutes ago in the medbay.” He’d been expecting the kid to be excited about that, but instead the kid went wide eyed and broke into a sprint. “Oye! Where the hell-”

And that was exactly when he was cut off by a scream and the sound of things breaking. Goddamn it. 

\----  
“Sombra! Està Bien! No las lastimes!” Jesse had cupped his hands around his face and was shouting as he skidded to a halt in front of the north wing of the medbay. Gabriel came up right behind him, he ready to deal with maybe a knife wound and a broken lamp or two. He wasn’t prepared for the absolute wreckage of the wing medbay that stood before him. Ana was pinned to the wall by a table that had been lodged into the wall around her, and everything else was barely standing. The curtains that surrounded patients has been torn off the hooks, the machines that monitored vitals were on fire, somehow, and the camera that had been placed in the corner of the room since his and Jack’s talk was blinking purple instead of the red it should’ve been. 

Before Ana could get out a word, Jesse had glanced around the room and centered in on one corner of it. Was it just Gabriel’s imagination or was there a faint glow to the kid’s eye? If there had been, it was gone too fast to be seen as the kid darted over to the corner. Gabriel watched as the kid knelt down next to seemingly nothing and began to murmur to the corner. Before he could ask what was going on, the air that Jesse had been speaking to shimmered, and the little girl who he’d picked up seemed to rematerialize out of thin air. Not sure what to make of this revelation, Gabriel turned to Ana to help pry the table out of the wall. Neither of them spoke, Ana just gave Gabriel a long look, and Gabriel did his best to not look her in the eyes. It wasn’t his fault he didn’t see the kid being this jumpy (or powerful for that matter). 

Okay that sounded like an excuse from Jack, Gabriel should have absolutely seen this coming, kids had been running with a gang. Either way, Ana was free and the pair turned back to assess the two children in the corner of the room. It seemed the girl (Sombra? What kinda name was that? Though if Gabriel was being entirely honest it was the sort of name he would’ve given himself at that age) had calmed down some but was still glaring daggers at the two of them as Jesse spoke to her in soft tones. 

“My apologies, I didn’t mean to spook you when I woke you up. Are you alright?” Ana’s voice was calm and had that motherly tone to it that she had gained in her years with Fareeha. Even though she might be annoyed at Gabriel for not warning her, none of that bled over to her words for the girl and bless her for that. 

The girl was still glaring, but she seemed a little taken aback by the lack of hostility from the women she’d thrown against the wall. She didn’t respond with words, but she nodded and that was good enough for Ana. “I’ll leave you to handle the rest of this than Gabriel, I promised Fareeha I’d be back in our room at twelve.” Then Gabriel was alone with two children, left to deal with the mess of the medical wing and the mess that was the two children in front of him. It seemed that the girl was calmer now, still wary, still watching Gabriel intensely but she didn’t seem ready to attack him and that was enough for right now. Jesse pushed himself to his feet and leaned over to pull up the girl who took his hand but kept her eyes on Gabriel. There was a tense silence to the room, thick enough it could be cut with a knife. 

Now Gabriel didn’t consider himself particularly good with children, he knew enough to keep ‘em alive and content as long as he could hand them off to their parents at the end of the day. The full weight of the fact that he was now responsible for these two children was just starting to hit him as they watched him with wary eyes. Still, he shrugged it off as panicking wasn’t going to do anyone any good, and instead decided to follow an age old truth that applied to any age group, food is the best way to win someone’s trust. 

“Alright, come on, let’s get some food in you two.” And with that Gabriel swept out of the room with two confused and wary children in tow.


	2. The First Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first night (and early morning) of Sombra and Jesse's stay with overwatch. A bit short, but it felt like a good place to end it. Next chapter will cover their first few days in overwatch, as well as some important introductions. It will be released whenever I feel like it and or get the focus to actually write something substantial.

Food, as it turns out, was the best idea Gabriel had ever had. The cafeteria was almost empty due to the time of night, but the two cafe workers who were on the midnight shift were more than happy to pile up plates full of food for him and the children and blessedly asked no questions. Jesse and… Sombra? He’d have to check if that was the name she wanted to be referred to by. Regardless, they both seemed shocked and wary at the amount of food put in front of them. Neither of them touched it, even after he had sat down with his own food. Right. Kids were from a world where nothing came for free.  
  
“Eat up, neither of you are any use to me half starved.” It wasn’t what he wanted to say. He wanted to say food shouldn’t be a tool against them. He wanted to say that both of them were far too thin. He wanted to say they were both far too young to be this wary of a plate of food. He didn’t say any of that though because neither of them would believe him, and that wasn’t the person that they needed him to be right now. There would be a point in the future for kindness and hugs, but right now both of these children had lived through far too much pain to trust anything but selfishness and themselves. Jesse was the first to move to eat, taking a tentative bite of the mashed potatoes. Sombra watched him for a few seconds, obviously watching for any signs of poisoning, but none came and as Gabriel began to eat his own food it seemed that she was convinced. Or just hungry enough to risk it.  
  
The difference between the two were stark. Both ate slowly and kept their eyes on him, but where Jesse was forceful and sloppy with his movements, glancing up and down from the plate to Gabriel, Sombra was neat and calculated keeping her eyes firmly on him the entire meal. It was a half-hour before the two had made their way through most of their plates, he’d purposefully given them more than they could have possibly eaten so they didn’t have to deal with asking for more food today. Still he could see the longing in Jesse’s eyes as he stared at the food still on his plate. Hm. Probably going to be best to get them a snack stash at some point in the near future so they didn’t end up hoarding rotting food. That was an issue for another night though.  
  
“Alright, let’s get you two to your room. I’ll go over the rules on the way there.” He stood and gestured for them to follow him, leaving the plates of food behind. Jesse gave one last longing look at the food but Sombra moved to follow him and he followed her. Gabriel didn’t miss how Jesse positioned himself between him and Sombra, nor how Sombra fell just a step behind them too of them, while Jesse kept pace. Hell if he wasn’t specifically keeping an eye on her with how silently the girl walked it would have been entirely possible to forget the girl was there at all. Perhaps that was what she wanted. Regardless, he had rules to go over so he cleared his throat and started in on his prepared list.  
  
“Rule one, no combat outside of training or unless given specific orders otherwise. This means no fighting other recruits, but it also means if something goes wrong or there’s an attack the both of you are not to engage. Untrained fighters are just as dangerous in combat as your enemies.”  
  
Jesse seemed to prickle at that, a point of pride perhaps, but Sombra nudged her own hand against his and that was enough for him to keep quiet. Gabriel continued with his list regardless.  
  
“Rule two, Jesse, you’ll show up where you're supposed to be when you're supposed to be there. First few weeks you don’t have to worry about that much as you’ll be with me most of the day. Sombra, Athena will tell you if you’re supposed to be anywhere and let you know where you are and are not allowed.”  
  
Sombra seemed to spook a little at being addressed directly, but the flash of uncertainty was gone from her features almost as soon as it appeared. Sombra nodded sharply, and though she clearly had question, likely about who this Athena was, she kept them to herself. Actually, Gabriel wasn’t sure he’d heard her speak at all. Jesse had called out to her earlier and she could clearly understand Gabriel even when he wasn’t facing her, so odds were she wasn’t deaf but mute was still a possibility. Time would tell.  
“Rule three, if you don’t know them, then you don’t talk to them. No exceptions. While I trust the two of you to know a thing or two about keeping quiet, you’re also both prime targets for spies or god forbid reporters. Don’t talk to anyone, don’t listen to anyone, unless you’ve been introduced by Jack, Ana or I. If, for some reason we have to send someone to get you two that you haven’t met before, then they’ll have a codeword you can check with Athena to verify. Otherwise they’re lying and you’re both to get the fuck outta there.”  
  
Both children nodded this time, hard lines on their faces and a grime tone to their eyes. Trust no one wasn’t a lesson he’d have to teach them, that much was for sure. They were approaching the room he’d ordered put aside, so he decided to wrap things up.  
  
“Finally, this room will be the two of yours. The only people who have access beyond the two of you to it are once again Jack, Ana or I. There’s a connected shower and bathroom area that also shouldn’t be accessible for anyone else. For the time being your door will be locked both ways between the hours of 9 pm to 6 am. There is no video or audio surveillance because I don’t give a fuck what you do in your free time, Athena is installed on the bracelets you’ll be wearing and any tech within Overwatch or Blackwatch should be connected to her. Her name is all you need to activate her, she can guide you around the base as well as answer any further questions.”  
  
He paused as he came up to the door and scanned his own bracelet to the door causing it to swoosh open. The room inside was fairly barebones, two beds, two dressers, a single closet and a small table, but given the conditions he’d seen at Deadlock, he doubt they’d mind. Both children were wide-eyed, through Sombra’s expression was far more restrained. Gabriel didn’t comment, instead he just gestured the two of them inside and reached into his pocket. He pretended he see didn’t how both of them instantly tensed up when he did that. Moving a bit slower than before, Gabriel pulled out two nearly identical bracelets, thin bands with three buttons.  
  
“Arms out.” The children were still tense, and Sombra was looking at the bracelets as if they were snakes. Still, they both held their arms out. Without preamble he cinched them on, first on Jesse and then on Sombra. “Alright, you don’t have to be wearing these at all times, but they’re your key to getting around this place. Athena’s connected to them, she should just respond to her name but if that doesn’t work the light blue button is a hardline to her. Red button is an emergency button, you hit that and your location is broadcast out to the closest agents as well as to command. Yellow button puts you into the comm channels, Athena will adjust your frequency for missions but otherwise it should connect to the command channel and the command channel only for now. Any questions?”  
  
Sombra looked like she had many questions, but once again she asked none of them. He had a feeling that her bracelet was going to be in pieces soon though given how she was eyeing it like Moira looked at her test subjects. Jesse just shook his head. “Alright, I’ll be back at 8 am tomorrow, be ready to go by then” and with that, Gabriel strode out the door.

Inside the bedroom, Sombra and Jesse made eye contact. Sombra pressed a finger to her lips and carefully activated her scanners. Her flinch told Jesse the pain from the implantations hadn’t faded yet, but she pressed on regardless. It was thirty seconds that felt like an hour as Jesse was forced to do nothing but watch Sombra battle through the pain of experimental implants her mind wasn’t ready for yet. Pulling out of her systems with a gasp, Sombra nearly keeled over. She was stopped only by Jesse who quickly moved her over to one of the beds.  
  
“We’re safe. He wasn’t lying as far as I can tell, nothin’ electronic beyond the watches, and those are basic listening, no active recording.”  
  
Jesse let out a relieved sigh, his shoulders slumping as he let the tension bleed out of them. No lies yet, but he was sure they’d start soon. Sombra slumped down as well, leaning on Jesse with instincts guiding her to face the door. One of them had to keep an eye on it. There was silence for a moment, as the two of them just breathed. In, out, in, out, in, out.  
  
“Soooooo, training?”  
  
Jesse sighed. He’d been hoping Sombra would be tired enough to just fall asleep.  
  
“Yep. Condition a’ us stayin’ here is I’m workin’ for them. ‘Parently he looked at those guys a’ his I shot and decided that was too good a talent ta waste.”  
  
Sombra was quiet for a minute, mulling over this new information and taking in everything that had happened over the day. Silence reigned over the room for a few minutes. Than she asked the question Jesse was hoping she wouldn’t.  
  
“He government?”  
  
“Sorta, said he runs something called Blackwatch. Don’t have to follow the law apparently. I didn’t tell him much but I told ‘im that there was someone afta us and he didn’t seem worried at all.”  
  
She was silent again, he let her be even if he felt a rising urge to try and convince her it was a good idea. Jesse wasn’t ready to say that he liked here, but anything was better than Deadlock after what he’d been through at their hands. And despite his better judgment, there was some desperate and childish part of Jesse that wanted to trust Gabriel.  
  
“I’ve heard of them before. Blackwatch. He might actually be able to keep ‘em away, at least for a little while.” She paused then, picking through possible word choice as a finicky child might pick through a salad. “The stuff they do though Jesse… It’s not pretty.”  
  
“Deadlock wasn’t pretty either.”  
  
“It was straightforward though, and it didn’t matter if you had to shoot someone you knew in the back there because they were all assholes. It’ll be harder too, not the petty shit from Deadlock.” Her tone was light, not harsh or worried, she sounded almost like a polite receptionist. Just facts, not judging, not pressing or saying she didn’t think he could do it. Just that poised tone. Jesse considered, but he wasn’t going to risk the two them being on their own again. Deadlock had been their best choice at the time, this was their best choice now.  
  
“I’ll survive it.” It was a promise. It was all he could promise her, all they’d ever been able to promise one another. It was enough.  
  
“Okay.” She said. “Okay.”  
  
They didn’t say anything else for the rest of the night. Old habits kicked in and they slept in 90 minute cycles, waking without prompting and falling asleep as soon as the other was up. It had been a long time since either of them had been able to sleep through the night.

On the other side of the base, there was far less sleeping happening. Gabriel was sitting at a table with his not-quite-husband on one side of him and Ana across the table. Each had a mug of coffee and Jack had a plate of something in front of him. He didn’t really know what, but it was edible and he was far too sleepy to care for much beyond the logistics of moving it to his face. He chewed through whatever it was that was in his mouth before half leaning half slumping on to Gabriel’s shoulder.  
  
“So what’s the plan for tomorrow?” Jack asked into Gabriel’s shoulder.  
  
“Gonna just take the kid out and see what he can do, nothing major just yet, just get a feel of where he’s at. Probably see if the girl wants to tag along as well an’ maybe see what I can find out about her.” Gabriel’s words were slow and more thought out, he didn’t really have much of a plan for anything given the curveballs this situation kept throwing him.  
  
That piqued Ana up enough to get her to stop staring at the wall (might’ve woken her up too, Gabriel was still convinced she could sleep with her eyes open) “No medical visit?”  
  
“Nah, I didn’t get the exact story out of ‘em, but between the kids being convinced they’re bein’ hunted and those enhancements on the girl it’d freak ‘em out too much for their first day here. Medical was able to confirm that they were alright when they were out, no need for anything more than that.”  
  
Ana nodded. Given the events from earlier that day (or technically the day before now, god what time was it?) she couldn’t blame him. The thought reminded her of her aching shoulders and the bruises on her side from where the table had struck her.  
  
“Might want to see if you can figure out exactly how strong that girl is. She’s what, 11? And she knocked me clear across the room and managed to follow it up with a table.” It had been a rather light table, but the point held.  
  
Gabriel just gave a non-committal grumble. It was Gabe-speak for ‘that’s an extra complication that’s not urgent right now so I’m going to pretend it doesn’t exist’ and leaned his head onto Jack’s, who it appeared had fallen asleep during their exchange. An hour later, after a few other little pieces of small talk, planning and finishing up the dregs of paperwork, Gabriel carried his not-husband to bed and within minutes was out himself.


	3. First Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hey so I'm not dead, just, uh, taking my time on this one. Anyways enjoy this update and again the next one will be out as I'm able to focus. Next chapter will be introducing Fareeha. 
> 
> Also I have [A tumblr](http://intothedarknessigo.tumblr.com/). Feel free to talk to me on there.

Gabriel lead Jesse out onto the mostly empty the shooting range, slower than his usual pace allowing Jesse amply to look around and adapt to his surrounds. It was still a touch early for most of the recruits to be out here, so they had the field mostly to themselves. The kid’s eyes were darting left and right, his posture tense and his head low. Sombra had decided to stay back in the room, seemingly preoccupied with talking to Athena, and Gabriel had a feeling that wasn’t helping with the kid’s mood. 

Doing his best to ignore the tension in the air, Gabriel marched the kid over to where he had a range already set up. He’d even gotten the kid’s empty gun out of evidence and dug through crates of ammo that morning until he’d found bullets that’d work with it. Damn thing was older than the kid was. He plucked the rusty old thing off the countertop and held it out to the kid, who took it, eyes lighting up. The gun in the kid’s hand seem to put him at some sort of ease and if that didn’t piss Gabriel the fuck off, he didn’t know what the else could. 

Turning around so the kid couldn’t see the fire in his eyes, Gabriel began to speak as he reached for the ammo. “Alright, for right now we’re not going to worry about form or anything like that, I just want you to show me what you can do. Okay kid?”

“Got it.” Jesse said in a firm tone as Gabriel turned back around with the box of ammo in his hand, only to see the kid raise up a gun that Gabriel knew damn well didn’t have bullets in it five seconds ago and mutter something. The rest seemed to happen in slow motion, the kid moved fast, too damn fast for his age and too damn fast for any human. If he’d blinked, Gabriel would have missed it but somehow there was a smoking tip to the gun, 6 targets hit dead center and the kid seemed out of breath. A few gasping breaths in, and then Jesse was looking up at Gabriel, searching eyes scared of what they’d find. 

Gabriel regarded the kid for a few seconds, his expression like a roman statue. “...There weren’t any bullets in that gun.” It was a statement of fact, he knew because he’d triple checked the damn thing to see if he could match the ammo type. Jesse looked caught, hand in the cookie jar and all. Gabriel let silence reign over the range, letting the kid decide exactly how he wanted this conversation to go. The silence stretched out like taffy, before finally the kid spoke in careful measured words, his tone too casual as his shoulder moved up in a poor mimicry of a shrug.

“Don’t need bullets.”

Another pause, Gabriel wanted to say something but there were words pulling at Jesse’s throat and he knew if he spoke he’d never hear them. When the boy spoke again, his gaze fell and his voice quieted down.

“Haven’t needed bullets in a long time.” Gabriel didn’t like anything that statement implied, he wanted to ask a million questions, wanted to ask none of them at all because it hurt to think about. In the end he didn’t get a chance to do anything his pager beeped, and it was like  
any fragile bond that had been formed in that moment had shattered along with the silence. Jesse looked away, his stance hardening and Gabriel turned away to answer the page. Ana’s number, huh she usually just texted him. 

“Reyes here, it better be urgent.”

“Gabriel, we just got the scans back on the kids. We were just trying to check for a concussion or any brain damage from the gas but… well I hate to say it but you need to come see these now.” 

“... Understood.”

Her tone had left no room for any argument, even if it had Gabriel’s mind was already running wild with possibilities and he wasn’t stopping till he got some answers. Turning back to the kid, one look told Gabriel that the kid had heard everything the poor thing was tense as a line and looked like he might flee at the slightest provocation. It took everything Gabriel had to not heave a sigh. Took reserves Gabriel didn’t know he had to not pull the kid into a hug. Instead he cleared his throat to get Jesse to look at him. 

“Listen kid… I know you don’t want me to see what’s on those scans. Ain't hard to guess it’s got something to do with the straight up magic that you just pulled off there, and pretty clearly it’s gonna be related to the people after you. But I need to know what’s there, because I’m your commanding officer and I’m responsible for you.” His tone was firm but not unkind and while the tension didn’t fade, Jesse didn’t look like he’d bolt at the slightest movement. 

“You’ve got two options, you can head back to your room grab your sister and the two of you can have the day off while me and Ana review this, or you can come with me for this conversation, but if you’re coming with we’re going to have questions.” Gabriel gave a pointed look with the last part of the statement, he knew the kid wasn’t going to want to answer anything but this information could be life or death. Jesse kicked at the ground, clearly weighing the options in his head. Gabriel let him take his time on his answer, since he knew what a loaded choice it was.

“I’ll go with ya.” It was quiet, more of a mumble than anything else but it was progress and Gabriel gave the kid a smile for it even if Jesse’s eyes were still firmly fixed on the ground. 

“Alright kid, let’s go get this over with.” Gabriel let the warm undertone to his voice seep through as he turned to lead the kid, handing him a holster for the gun (and no Gabriel did not spend a solid 20 minutes digging through old equipment to find a leather one that fit the kid’s cowboy theme and anyone who told you otherwise was a traitor to overwatch). Jesse told the holster and carefully threaded it around his waist, a touch more confident with his gun safely tucked away. 

They walked in silence to Gabriel and Ana’s usual room in the med-bay for any confidential matters, the base was starting to wake up and the kid got some weird looks but nobody said a damn thing much to Gabriel’s satisfaction. Ana was already in the room when they arrived with thick tension in the air. She took in the two of them with a single long look in which she both arrived at her own conclusions and practically had an hour long argument with Gabe all in the span of a few seconds. In the end, she conceded with what was barely a flick of her eyes but coming from Ana it might as well have been a full blown eye roll. 

“While you were out we did a bunch of scans, mostly checking for concussion, brain damage from the gas or any previous wounds there were hanging around that we needed to know about. We took full body scans for you but didn’t want to risk doing any on your… friend since we didn’t know how her enhancements would react to the machinery. Still need to do those soon. Regardless, when we took a look at the results from your head scans...” As she trailed off, Ana pulled up a set of images on the display screens before them. 

It took Gabriel a minute of staring to figure out what he was seeing. The skull of the kid was easy enough to make out, he’d seen enough mission reports and medical documentation to understand that everything there looked alright. No, there was nothing wrong there, what was wrong was the stem of gray fuzzy… somethings that extended from the kid’s pupil all the way back through the kid’s brain. The fuzziness seemed most heavily connected to the kid’s motor cortex, cerebellum and occipital lobe, but the tendrils of whatever it was were strung through the whole system. Gabriel turned his eyes, first to the kid who immediately turned his gaze downwards looking shell-shocked, probably his first time seeing what was going on in his own head. Back to the display, Gabriel carefully manipulated the display, but he couldn’t make out what exactly the grey stuff was meant to be, eyes back to Ana now.

“Mind telling me exactly what I’m looking at here?” Cautious, open, mostly directed at Ana but if the kid wanted to pipe up here he wasn’t going to complain. 

“We aren’t exactly sure, something metal for sure so we’re assuming some form of nanotech, but we didn’t go in with these scans expecting to find something like this so details are limited. What I can tell you is that whatever they are, they move and they’re wrapped through pretty much every part of his brain.” She might’ve added more detail, but Jesse chose that moment to speak up and answer the questions that he wasn’t being asked.

“They’re nanotech augmentations that give me a… targeting system. I don’t miss even when I’m trying to. Let’s me make bullets from the nanobots too, just takes the wind outta me. Sombra knows more ‘bout how it works, she messed with ‘em awhile back and changed ‘em so they’ll self-reproduce. They only respond to chemical signaling now too, so they can’t get into my head anymore. I’ve had ‘em since I was five or somewhere close ta it.” 

Ana and Gabriel exchanged a glance over the kid’s head. Jesse wasn’t looking either of them in the eyes and it was paining the both of them to see him like this. It was Ana that spoke up first. “Does it hurt you at all to use?”

A shake of the head, than a nod, than a confused shrug. Jesse chanced a look up at the two adults in the room, neither seemed angry with him for not having a clear answer. There was an expectant silence in the room, and while Jesse really didn’t want to reveal any weaknesses anymore than he had to, he wasn’t sure he had a choice here. There was a whole base of highly trained soldiers with all sorts of tech here, he wasn’t going to win a firefight and that was assuming they didn’t get to Sombra before he could. No chance of fighting his way out meant that they could force him to do whatever they wanted, and that meant that if they didn’t like his answers about what was going on in his head than they could force whatever scans they wanted anyways. And.

And.

And Jesse wanted to tell them. He couldn’t let on to Sombra how much it hurt, even if she probably knew. Deadlock never cared enough to ask and They had known exactly how much pain he was in already. 

“It hurts sometimes, when I gotta shoot a lot of people with no bullets. Six or less is okay though, sometimes I kin do more without pain if I’ve eaten ‘n slept recently enough. Doesn’t usually hurt much though, got used to it.” 

The adults in the room shared another look. It was Ana who spoke up this time.  
“Thank you for telling us about this Jesse. I’ll make a note on your medical file for the future and I trust that you won’t be needing to do any shooting without bullets for awhile. What I’d like to do next is a full medical on both you and Sombra if you are both willing? These sorts of augmentations are often highly volatile and if they don’t have safeguards to prevent the two of your from overusing them than there’s no telling what they could do. don’t know how much we’ll be able to find out from the normal protocols, but at the very least it will help establish a baseline for the future.” 

Jesse tensed up the moment Sombra’s name was brought up, and Gabriel could pinpoint the exact moment the distrust filtered into the kid’s eyes. “...Why do ya need anything on her?” This was exactly why Gabriel had been hoping to push off the medical appointment until after there was some trust built up. Didn’t look like they’d be able to wait that long though, not with this new development. Gabriel didn’t miss how Jesse’s fingers twitched towards his gun either.

“It’s standard for anyone living on base. We do get attacked from time to time, people get sick when they’re around other people, accidents happen or hell she could have an allergic reaction to just about anything for all we know right now. If any of that happens we need to have any idea of what’s safe to treat her with so we don’t end up making things worse.”

It made sense, and Jesse seemed less likely to shoot someone, though he still seemed highly skeptical. Ana intervened before Gabriel could try to push the issue. “Why don’t the two of you go find Sombra and grab breakfast first? It’s best to do the examines on a full stomach anyways. I don’t have anything but paperwork on my docket today so you can talk it over with her, and if you both consent than we can get it all out of the way today. If she wants to wait on her exams, than that’s her choice and I won’t push the issue.”

That got Jesse to relax, and he nodded quietly at the suggestion, looking up at Gabriel for confirmation. “Sounds like a plan to me, come on kid.” Ana and Gabe would need to have a conversation about this later but it could wait until he had a read on how much Sombra knew about what the hell was going on in Jesse’s brain. Giving Ana a nod of thanks, Gabriel turned out of the room, pulling his watch up as he did so. 

“Athena, could you give me an idea of where Sombra is right now?” 

“Negative. Sombra removed her bracelet two minutes after Jesse left the room, she then cloaked herself with an invisibility device that has rendered me unable to detect her. The door opened several times after her cloaking, but I was not able to detect if she left the room or if she has re-entered.” 

Gabriel started down at his watch in disbelief, Athena was an incredible advanced AI system that should’ve been able to keep track of one kid. Even cloaking tech shouldn’t have prevented Athena’s heat sensors from picking up on where the kid was. Jesse just sighed, as if he’d expected this. He moved up his bracelet and pressed the yellow radio button.

“Sombra, meet us outside tha med-bay. Don’t be mean ta the security lady. Jesse out.” 

“That won’t work kid, the channels are highly secured and can only be accessed from authorized bracelets-”

“Be there in five. Sombra out.”

Huh. Guess they’d be needing a security upgraded on the communication channels then. Maybe he’d see if Sombra was interested in giving IT a few pointers given that it’d apparently taken the kid less than 24 hours to cloak herself from Athena’s security measures and get on secure channels without her bracelet on. 

For right now though, it was time for breakfast.


End file.
